What Type of EU? Conceptions of the EU in the Riksdag in the Aftermath of the EU's COVID-19 Crisis

Abstract

This case-study examines how political parties in Sweden view and understand the EU in terms of political system and whether this changed following the COVID-19 crisis. The research questions of this thesis are as follows: What types of conceptions of the EU do political parties in Sweden have? And did their conceptions of the EU change following the COVID-19 crisis? This study is a qualitative document analysis in which the parties’ views on the EU and its response to the COVID-19 crisis are assessed in terms of an intergovernmental and a neofunctional polity conception of the EU. To find out what types of conceptions of the EU parties in Sweden had before the COVID-19 crisis, the parties’ manifestos from the Riksdag and EP elections in 2018 and 2019 were assessed. To determine whether the parties’ conceptions of the EU changed following the COVID-19 crisis, the parties’ views on the EU’s response to the COVID-19 were assessed. The study finds that before the COVID-19 crisis the Moderate Party, the Christian Democrats, the Centre Party, the Left Party, and the Sweden Democrats all had an intergovernmental conception of the EU (IGC). The Liberal Party was found to have a neofunctional conception of the EU (NFC). The study also finds that while there were differences in how the parties viewed and acted in relation to the EU’s crisis response, none of the parties examined changed their conceptions of the EU following the COVID-19 crisis. However, while none changed their conceptions of the EU, the study also finds that the Moderate Party, the Christian Democrats, and the Centre Party did not act in accordance with their conception of the EU. These parties did not oppose the EU’s crisis response and therefore accepted that NGEU would strengthen the EU’s supranational institutions and increase the EU’s fiscal capacity, albeit temporarily. The theoretical implication of this is that while these parties subscribe to an intergovernmental model of the EU, their actions during the crisis can be viewed in terms of a neofunctional logic of integration.